


four in a box

by bluewalk



Series: 30_onepiece: Sanji [10]
Category: One Piece
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-10
Updated: 2011-12-10
Packaged: 2017-10-27 03:53:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/291340
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluewalk/pseuds/bluewalk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>[#9 treasure] <em>simple like love, a conviction stronger than hunger.</em></p>
            </blockquote>





	four in a box

Luffy’s hat is the embodiment of a promise, an icon of infamy, a banner around which they all rally—but in Sanji’s hands, it’s not quite so grand as all of that. It’s an old, battered thing, fraying at the edges and faded from the sun. The woven straw is bumpy beneath his fingertips, sodden with seawater when he fishes it out of the ocean, and it tastes too strongly of salt when he holds it between his teeth on his climb back up to the deck.

But the first words out of Luffy’s mouth upon waking are, as always, “Where is it, Sanji?” and when Sanji slaps it back on Luffy’s head, it makes a wet _gsh_ sound and drips water all over Luffy’s boyish, sun-browned shoulders.

Luffy beams at him, true gratitude and truer smile. “I knew you wouldn’t lose it.”

And he wouldn’t. It’s a constant of life, like nakama, like adventure, like Luffy’s bottomless appetite, like the stars—he’ll find All Blue, and he’ll never lose Luffy’s hat, battered and faded though it is. Simple like love, a conviction stronger than hunger. No other way about it.

 

  
They’re diving for oysters and mussels and abalones just off the coast of a tiny island at the tail end of an archipelago, the two of them in a rickety little rowboat under a sky so blue it’s electric. He’s just resurfaced with a bulging net of clacking shells, hair in his eyes and a wet grin on his face. “Beat that, marimo,” he says, a little breathless as he pulls himself back into the boat, the net thumping down noisily besides him. The boat creaks under the extra weight.

Zoro stands and stretches, and Sanji pretends not to see the blood dotting the bandage wrapped around Zoro’s torso. Zoro unbuckles his swords, two plus Wadou, and he holds them out, drops them wordlessly into Sanji’s open hands. Sanji catches them neatly and places them lengthwise across his lap. Understand that trust between them is the thing without a tongue.

Zoro fills his lungs with salt air, and dives in like a knife.

His hair is already drying under the sun, a warm breeze at his back. He can smell sword polish even over the ocean, runs his thumb absently over Wadou’s embroidered hilt, white like the sun-bleached sand of the shore. He doesn’t have to unsheathe her to know that she is polished to mirror-perfection. He doesn’t know much about Zoro, but he knows that Zoro is like that.

He smiles, imagines it reflected off Wadou’s curved blade. Wonders if she’s used to seeing Zoro’s smile as well. He hopes so.

 

  
One day after lunch, she calls out, “Come sit with me, Sanji-kun,” and he drops everything to run to her side, twirling hearts and adoration. He misses the way she rolls her eyes.

Nami’s mikan grove is a little slice of paradise on the high seas. Shade from the relentlessly beating sun, a cool wind filtered through citrus-scented leaves—everything is quieter in the grove, calmer, a sanctity found nowhere else on the ship.

“Just sit,” she commands in response to his theatrics, and he does, aware of the sacredness of this place, of Nami’s wish and will.

The green canopy of leaves translucent under the sun, a papery rustle as the sea breeze runs its fingers through the grove, a sweetness in the air that reminds him of summer days on land.

“It smells like her,” Nami says, suddenly. He’s never heard her voice sounding so soft. “She always smelled like cigarette smoke and mikans. It smells like her here, right now.”

He exhales slowly, carefully, nurses his cigarette with a furrowed brow. Elsewhere, the boys are screeching up a storm, but the noise sounds muted and distant. He waits, watching the dappled light move across her outstretched legs.

“I had a family,” she goes on. “The three of us. She said so.”

“You still do,” he says immediately, quiet, with conviction, defensive maybe, a little scared, completely in love.

She only nods. Picks up a fallen mikan, hefts its slight weight in her hand. She meets his eyes finally and says, “But I miss her.”

He doesn’t have anything to say to her that would be enough to erase this kind of hurt, nothing timely to offer except what’s in his lungs, and so he releases it, like he’s done a hundred million times before, but this time it is more than just an act of vice—half an evocation, smoke like wind turning a prayer wheel.

She closes her eyes, holds the mikan against her lips, and she laughs a little, says, “That’s fine, Sanji-kun. Thank you.”

 

  
“She’ll bring us to the ends of the world and back,” Usopp says. “She will. She’ll sail us all around the Grand Line, and she’ll bring us to meet all sorts of crazy, amazing people, giants and fishfolk and s-seakings, maybe. Oh, and definitely mermaids. I know you’d like that, Sanji. You’d like the mermaids.”

“I would.”

“And we’ll have all sorts of adventures with her. She’ll bring Zoro to meet Mihawk again, and Nami will map out the entire Grand Line from her decks. Luffy will be crowned pirate king sitting right there on her figurehead. And she’ll find All Blue for you, Sanji, I just know she will. All our dreams are riding on her.”

“And yours?”

“I’m Captain Usopp, warrior of the seas! And a captain needs his ship. A captain needs his ship and a ship needs her captain. So I’ll fix you right up, Merry, don’t worry. Nothing some wood and nails and my shipbuilding expertise can’t handle. And then I’ll find Luffy and nail him to the mast, that bastard…”

“You really love her, eh, Longnose?”

“You will too, soon. She won’t let you down. I promise.”

“I believe you.”

“And we won’t let you down either, Merry.”

Sanji hands him the box of nails. “No, we won’t.”

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted 08 September 2011

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Chinese translation on "four in a box"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/400322) by [renata](https://archiveofourown.org/users/renata/pseuds/renata)




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